


Walkabout

by Scruggzi



Category: Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries
Genre: F/M, MFMM Year of Tropes - Amnesty Month, Misunderstandings, angling with a happy ending, forest based shagnanigans, implied fishing, sulky Jack
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-10 23:39:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12922674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scruggzi/pseuds/Scruggzi
Summary: Jack's gone fishing, Phryne is not about to let him sulk.





	Walkabout

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks as always to Firesign for being an amazing beta, and for insisting that Jack wash his hands after handling wood - always the sanitary option.

The grey wood smoke curled up towards the trees as Jack poked at the fire and added a little more fuel. The brace of trout he had caught for his dinner were arranged on a tin plate, already cleaned, and he had managed to scrounge some bushland herbs to season them with. The fire was not yet quite hot enough for cooking and he was tending it with a methodical care, keeping his mind on his task.

It was preferable to the alternative.

At least out here, far away from his desk and his routine, he could be without the constant little reminders; his treacherous heart didn’t have to skip a beat at every harsh ring of the telephone, or falter at every crime scene as he listened for the sharp clip of a heel which would not come. No, she had made that much _perfectly_ clear.

He poked the fire with more vigour than necessary, sending up a cloud of sparks to join the smoke.

_He had been such a damned fool._

He’d known it, had her pegged from the first moment he laid eyes on her. Trouble. He had taken such care not to fall for her games and yet, somehow, she had worked her way in and now here he was. Alone. Heartbroken. Just as he had known he would be. It beggared belief that he had managed to fool himself into thinking that she cared for him too.

The wind shifted direction, blowing the smoke from his fire into his face and making him choke. He moved round to the leeward side, plonking himself down on a tree stump and wiping his streaming eyes with his thumb and fingers. He plunged his head into his water bucket to clear them, wiping his face and hands on the loose front of his shirt.

“Have you any idea how long it takes to find a sulking policeman all the way out here?”

His head snapped up; when it came to that voice his muscles were apparently uninterested in his opinion. She was there, standing on the far side of the clearing in flight boots and a long cotton skirt, the heavy pack she had been carrying lying on the ground beside her. He could see the pin he had given her glinting at the collar of her blouse. That hurt. Hurt was good; anger served him better than despair right now. What the hell was she doing here? Hadn’t she done enough to humiliate him?

“What are you doing here, Miss Fisher?”

“Why, I came to find you, of course.” She sounded matter of fact, as if her being there was the most obvious and natural thing in the world. He should have known.

“Of course,” his voice was leaden with sarcasm to which she was impervious as ever. “I wasn’t expecting you.” Which was foolish in itself, if ever there was a woman certain to turn up where she was least expected and less wanted…even in his head that lie didn’t sound at all convincing.

“I spoke to Hugh.” She continued, for all the world as if he hadn’t spoken. “The poor boy is worried sick about you. Apparently you upped sticks and went walkabout nearly a month ago and nobody’s heard from you since. That’s not like you, Jack.”

He glared at her. How dare she? How dare she be here? After everything she had done to him. As if nothing had happened.

“I had leave booked. I decided not to waste it.”

She did not rise to his bait.

“Well, it’s not quite the reunion I anticipated but it will have to do. You’ve found a marvellous spot; we must have a dip in the lake later, the water looks divine.”

Her ridiculous pretence that nothing had changed, that she had not thrown him aside without a thought, and now, apparently, changed her mind and expected to waltz back into his life as if none of it meant anything…it was beyond belief. He was in no mood to be polite. He would not by toyed with like this.

“Phryne, what the hell are you doing here?”

“I told you, I came to find you, why else would I be here?” She was moving around the fire and only anger let him stand his ground. Or perhaps he had frozen, his instincts torn between running to her and flinching away.

“Why? You made it quite clear that you had other plans.”

She looked genuinely confused and a tiny glimmer of hope shone momentarily behind his eyes. He clamped down on it at once. She would not make a fool of him twice. He would not allow it.

In a voice saturated with sarcasm he quoted the telegram he had received from her. “’ _Not coming back. Won’t say it again.’_ You didn’t leave much room for interpretation.”

A look of dawning realisation and horror crossed her face.

“Jack, Jack no, that wasn’t for you.”

“Really? My sympathies to whichever fool you had me confused with.”

She looked as if she had been punched in the gut. Part of him wanted to relish in the satisfaction of that little moment of petty vengeance but it wasn’t in him. She had him so caught up that even now the pain on her face felt like a bruise to his own heart.

Phryne was angry now. How dare he? How dare he assume that she didn’t care? How dare he think so little of her that he could get that message and not even consider there had been a mistake? How dare he not know how insufferably difficult it had been to be away from him?

“I shall let my mother know. Although I may have to tidy up the language in case you have occasion to meet her one day.” He was not the only one who could deploy sarcasm like a knife blade, and she had the truth on her side.

His mouth hung open, he looked rather like the gutted fish beside the fire, cut open and waiting to be barbequed.

“Your mother?”

“Clearly the telegraph operator made a mistake. At least that explains why she stopped haranguing me about returning to London, she must have gotten your telegram instead.”

“My telegram?”

“Yes, the one telling you I was heading home. And that I _missed you_.” She shot it at him like an accusation but it filled him with a happiness he had not felt since she had left Melbourne. He was almost ready to trust it.

“You did?”

Jack realised suddenly that he was moving towards her, his body apparently several steps in front of his brain, which was still trying to come to terms with the idea that she was there at all. It was possible she was some kind of mirage, or hallucination; perhaps he had misidentified the mushrooms he had eaten at lunch. He reached her but did not reach out, still not certain how to respond to her presence. His world, as it so often was around her, turned upside-down.

She was glaring at him. “So that’s why you’ve been out here all this time? For goodness sake Jack, you couldn’t have replied, or waited? I sent a telegram to Dot the day after.”

“I...” he swallowed, not entirely sure how to reply to that. It had been such a shock, he hadn’t wanted to believe it, but he was not about to make a dammed fool of himself chasing after her if she didn’t want him. That had been the truth of it.

“You thought I had thrown you over, left you and everyone else in Melbourne to go galivanting about the globe without a care?”

“Something like that.” He was blushing; he could feel his ears heating up under the strength of her gaze but somehow he couldn’t look away.

Phryne’s anger had not abated. She was furious; she thought Jack knew her, thought that he of all people would know that whatever her faults, she would never be that callous. On the other hand, he was standing there in casual brown trousers and shirt sleeves. Unshaved, unbuttoned and unguarded, with his hair loose and a little longer than she remembered. He looked a mess. A very, very attractive mess. There really was only one logical solution to this problem

She reached up and kissed him, a fierce admonishing kiss, chastising him for ever believing she didn’t love him, that she could just walk away from this partnership they had built as if it meant nothing to her. If he had any reservations left at that point they were no match for the feel of her lips on his and her tongue demanding entry to his mouth. He gave up. Kissing her back, letting his hands wander to her waist, feeling the press of her against him, her body close, her hands busy exploring the muscles of his back through the thin cotton of his shirt.

The world shifted from perpendicular to horizontal; Phryne had managed to tip them over and Jack hit the soft, leafy floor of the forest with a thump, catching her in his arms, desperate not to stop kissing her even as the breath was driven from his body by the impact. She was tearing at his buttons, frantic with the need to get to his skin, to devour every part of him. To remind him exactly who had his heart, and to let him know with every scrape of sharp nails and gentle, soothing press of her lips and tongue that he was not in this alone. She needed him, and she was no longer prepared to wait.

Phryne gasped out his name as she moved above him, the rocking of her hips massaging his hardening cock through the thin barriers of fabric that separated them. All the careful, rational objections to ever going anywhere near this woman again that Jack had constructed since receiving that telegram were obliterated by the feel of the exquisite heat between her thighs, by the want that coursed through him at her every touch. He happily abandoned reason. Opting instead to pull her blouse out from her skirt and work his hands underneath, finding soft satin and softer skin and the perfect hard points of her nipples against his calloused fingers. He raised himself up until their faces were level and pulled her closer; now the initial shock had worn off he was right there with her, pressing his tongue into her mouth and pinching her nipple between his fingers, her gasp of surprise and delight at his rough touch spurring him on.

Her hands had roamed lower, palming his erection through his trousers before drawing him out, stroking him until he was panting incoherent words of want into her neck and jaw. He reached down finding the buttons that fastened her camiknickers with surprising ease. A good thing too, else he might have simply torn them off. His fingers sank into the wet heat of her, slick and ready; after only a few strokes Phryne pulled him away, determined to fuck him senseless – whether in retaliation for their fight or because she could simply no longer bear the distance between them she didn’t know and no longer cared. She sank onto him, hard, taking him to the hilt in one thrust. Jack moaned aloud, his eyes rolling back in his head as he dropped, weightless, his shoulders pressing into the leafy ground and gave in to her entirely. The sound she made was somewhere between surrender and a crow of triumph, although adjudication on that point was hardly a priority. She stilled, relishing the feel of him inside her, leaning forward to press her lips to his, tenderly, softly, waiting until he could focus on her before she began to move, giving him time to adjust.

When he opened his eyes his vision was full of her, her blue eyes clear and full of love, the ends of her hair tickling his face where she was leaned in close.

“I missed you.” She meant it. Even his deep reserves of cynicism couldn’t bring him to doubt her words.

“I missed you too.”

He had nothing left to fight her with, and besides, the muscles of her cunt were trembling around the pulsing length of his cock in a way which would surely drive him mad; he was in no position to argue. Jack pressed his hips upwards, a slight, almost involuntary, action that spurred her on to move. Phryne began to ride him in smooth hard strokes, his hands at her hips guiding her rhythm. He was groaning out an incoherent string of curses and moans and as her muscles clenched tighter around him she began to pant out his name at every thrust, a high flush appearing over her cheekbones, sweat beading her brow in the humid air.

_“Ohgodohgod fuck, Jack, fuuuck!”_

 She slumped forward, dropping kisses to his mouth, his jaw, the strong lines of his cheeks, her hands in the tousled curls of his hair.

“God, I love you. Stubborn. Proud. Infuriating man.”

That was possibly the last thing he had expected and it acted on Jack like a stimulant, he pulled her mouth to his. His large hand gripping the back of her head as he kissed her deep, driving into her from below until they were both delirious and gasping for breath.

_“Love. You. Love you, so much.”_

His fractured attempt at speech was drowned by a cracked groan that came all the way from the base of his being as he felt her tremble and shake around him again and he lost himself in her, drawing in ragged lungfuls of fragrant forest air as the world went white.

When Jack was once again aware of his surroundings he realised, a little to his chagrin, but largely to his satisfaction, that he was lying in a pile of leaves, almost completely dressed and still embedded in an equally dressed, and apparently equally sated Phryne Fisher. This was not how he had expected his day to progress.

“Now that was the reunion I was looking forward to.” Phryne’s mesmerising eyes had softened to a shade of turquoise, like bright sunlight over a shallow sea. She stroked the hair out of his eyes where it had flopped down, before snuggling into his neck.

A little lost for what to say, Jack pressed gentle kisses into Phryne’s hair, which smelt of woodsmoke and wild things, not even the tiniest hint of her usual perfume detectable on her skin. She must have been traveling for a long time to find him all the way out here.

“Thank you for coming to find me; I’m still not sure how you managed it, we must be miles from anyone.”

She elected to ignore his thanks, not wanting to return to their argument and the conversation they would eventually have to have about it. The assumptions behind his retreat to this place had run deeper than a misunderstanding; part of him still did not trust her, and that was something they were going to have to fix. Right now though, she was too happy and satisfied to even consider that complex undertaking and opted to tease him instead.

“Oh that was easy, Inspector, I just followed the pall of brooding clouds gathered above your head. Besides, Miss Charlesworth would never have let me make it all the way through Warleigh Grammar without learning how to use a map and compass.”

“Of course.” He swallowed, “Phryne, I’m…” she cut him off with a kiss before he could apologise, there would be time for that. All the time in the world maybe.

“Hush!” she didn’t need to hear it, not now, perhaps not ever, she knew how he felt. In a tone that brooked no argument she moved the conversation forward and on to more pleasant matters. “Now, it looks to me as if you were about to start cooking, Perhaps you would care to invite me to supper before our dip in the lake?”

Not having been given much of an option, and still too thrown by her unexpected presence to reconcile the incongruous gentility of ‘supper’ with the little fire he had built in the woodland grove, Jack managed a nod. Then, deciding he might need to pick up the pace a little if he wanted to keep up with her, he tipped her off his lap as he stood, straightening his clothing and offering her a hand up.

“Would you care to join me, Miss Fisher? I can’t promise it will be up to Mr Butler’s standards.”

“I’d be delighted, Inspector.” Grasping his hand, she pulled herself up and stepped forward until she was standing very close to him, smoothing down her skirt with one hand whilst leaning up to whisper in his ear. “And I should probably warn you, I didn’t think to pack a bathing suit.”

The sound of Jack’s laughter echoed up through the overhanging trees, rippling out in waves of joy across the unbroken expanse of a cloudless, summer sky.

**Author's Note:**

> This came from an amazing prompt by Whopooh 'A mistake at the telegraph office leads Jack to believe Phryne's not coming back, when she returns to Melbourne things are not as she expects.' I hope I did it justice.


End file.
